CHAPTER V.

_April 24._--Orders to march to-morrow morning to Thermonde. At a loss to know where this can be, but find it is Dendermonde. Whether this be in consequence of any movement of the French army, or only for the purpose of concentration, we are in the dark. The other troops of horse-artillery in Ghent have also received orders to march, but we move independently of each other. To-day passed in preparation, visiting, and leave-taking. Called on my host, whom I found in a handsome well-furnished drawing-room at the back of the house, looking over a very nice garden. Had no idea of so much cheerfulness and comfort existing under our roof, nor of the two good-looking women I found with him. After much complimenting we parted.

_25th._--Fine morning. Marched early; leaving Ghent by the road already mentioned as passing under the Citadel, and crossing that flat but splendid country which I understand extends without interruption to Antwerp, or rather to the Tête de Flandre. This is the Pays de Waes, perhaps the highest cultivated land in Europe. It is said to have been once little better than moving sand, but that the great quantities of manure laid on it for so many successive centuries have completely changed its nature, and produced the fine rich black mould which is now everywhere of considerable depth. If this be true, it will in some measure account for the hillock already spoken of, which is entirely of sand. Passing close under this, I could not but be struck by the circumstance of this sandy mound standing in the midst of an otherwise unbroken level, and conjectured it must be artificial--one of those enormous tumuli erected as the tomb of departed warriors, or as a look-out, which was a common Roman custom, particularly in so flat a region. It is about the height of Silbury, perhaps less, but by no means of so regular a form; its slope, which is covered with trees and bushes, being excavated and broken in numerous places, probably for the sand. Standing as it does amidst a grove of trees, through the boles of which one catches pretty peeps of the blue distance, and crowned by the little chapel, independent of its historical or geological existence, it is really a very interesting object, and forms an admirable foreground to a picture of the Pays de Waes. Every one does not understand the beauty of a landscape the principal feature of which is a dead level. Yet these, like others, have their beauties, which consist principally in the effect under which they are seen, and the delicious tones of the aerial perspective gradually melting into the purply tints of extreme distance. I have often found very exquisite beauty in these flat Flemish scenes, especially when relieved and animated by groups of men and cattle, such as one sees in Cuyp and all the Dutch and Flemish masters. Whether from the richness of the soil, or some peculiar quality of the atmosphere, I know not, but I always fancied the colouring here much more vivid than in England, and the distances much more purply--quite Italian. But I am halting under the hill; so to proceed. Our road led us through the midst of this magnificent Pays de Waes, everywhere exhibiting such crops and such pastures as it is difficult to form an idea of--the latter covered with fine beasts, which I understand are brought hither from Holland to fatten. We passed through several populous villages, particularly Locristy and Seven Eeke, and about fifteen miles from Ghent reached Lokeren, a large manufacturing town, having all the dirty, smoky, dismal appearance of our northern manufacturing places, to which the blackish-coloured stone--somewhat, in colour at least, resembling the slag used about Bristol as a building material--contributes not a little. The houses, of three and four storeys, appeared tenanted each by many families; and the population had all the squalid, filthy character of our own manufacturing population, always excepting those of Stroudwater and the bottoms in Gloucestershire. Cloth is the article fabricated here, but of what quality I know not.

A strong column of Hanoverian infantry, composed of several battalions of militia, crossing our route, detained us at the entrance of the town more than half an hour, to the great amusement of a crowd of gazing weavers and dyers, with upturned sleeves and blue hands and arms, who surrounded us. The Hanoverians were fine-looking troops, generally very young, and completely English in dress and appointments, except that the officers wore particoloured sashes. Each battalion had a very good band, though rather noisy, from the number of jingling instruments entering into its composition--as cymbals, triangles, ottomans, &c. &c.--all which are much more patronised by foreigners than by us. The Chaussée terminating at Lockeren, when we continued our march it was on a bad cross-road, which soon brought us to Zêle--a large populous manufacturing village, having a wide, clean street. Houses in the cottage style, and generally only of one floor. The whole population turned out to see us pass, with the _curé_ at their head--a tall, respectable-looking old man, who, judging from the good-humoured countenance with which he scrutinised our column as it passed, and the air _empressé_ with which he came forward to offer his advice respecting the road to Dendermonde, I set down either as a very amiable person, or very zealous in the cause of legitimacy: we were feeling our way without a guide, and therefore had to ask. The respectful, quiet, and contented air of his flock spoke also in his favour, and, together with the bright eyes of numerous pretty women among the crowd, left a favourable impression of Zêle.

Henceforward the scenery took a very different aspect, and we exchanged the smiling, populous, well-wooded country we had been hitherto traversing for a lugubrious, marshy tract, devoid of anything that could break its monotony--neither trees nor houses, and but few cattle, were to be seen, whilst the abominable road became so slippery that it was with difficulty our horses could keep their feet.

About half a league from Dendermonde we struck the Scheldt, but could see nothing of it or the opposite country for the high dyke by which the river is here confined, and along the foot of which, for some little distance, our road lay, until it brought us to a wooden bridge elevated nearly thirty feet above the water, and so tottering that it was necessary to pass by single divisions, and even then its vibrations were not pleasant. Our quartermaster, who had been sent in advance, met us here, with orders not to halt in Dendermonde, but to proceed on to St Gille, situated beyond it on the Brussels road. The appearance of things improved here, from the number of trees about Dendermonde, which we soon after entered by a long, straight, narrow, gloomy, mean-looking street of low houses, built of the same dark stone we had seen at Lokeren. This led us to a spacious quay, encompassing what I supposed to be the harbour, for the water was very low, and the mud bare, like Bristol. Passing round the head of this, we soon left the town again, and almost immediately found ourselves at St Gille, which consists of a few mean houses scattered along the Chaussée, the only decent one being that of a _juge de paix_, on which I found myself billeted.

In a country so carefully cultivated as this is, a piece of waste land is a rarity, and therefore we had some difficulty in forming our park, which at last was done in a small enclosed cemetery, not without disturbing the ashes of the dead, and running some risk of breaking our horses’ legs and our own necks, for the graves had all been so loosely filled in that the horses sank to their shoulders in the light soil. Our men and horses were dispersed amongst the neighbouring farms of the commune, and though rather widely scattered, yet most comfortably put up everywhere.

Whilst employed at the park my servant had taken my baggage to my billet, so that on repairing thither I found Madame la Juge, _en habit de Dimanches_, already waiting at the door to receive me. A fine and handsome woman, perhaps turned of thirty, and possessing a degree of _embonpoint_ which, whilst it added dignity to her air, detracted nothing from the grace of her person. She received me with more than common politeness, with kindness and cordiality, which, as an intruder, I felt I had no right to expect, and, conducting me into the house, assured me that it should be her study to render my stay at St Gille as agreeable as possible, ushering me into an apartment destined for my use, and offering the assistance of her servants--in short, the whole house was at my disposal. All this was not mere compliment, for in good truth she kept her word to the very letter. I never experienced greater kindness, or more sincere hospitality, and under such circumstances soon felt myself perfectly at home in my neat lodgings.

What a contrast was this to the gloomy billet I left in the morning in the silent, solitary Rue de Bruges! Here everything was light, airy, and cheerful. But I must describe my new home. The _apartment_ consisted of a saloon of about eighteen feet square, with a little cabinet or sleeping-room adjoining and opening from it. Both were as clean as it was possible to conceive anything could be, and the white walls perfectly immaculate. Furniture of the simplest kind--chairs of oak or walnut ranged along the walls, two tables covered with oil-cloth, neat but scanty window-curtains, with draperies and fringe, and a most brilliant stove, _en faïence_, ornamented with brass-work, standing out nearly in the middle of the floor; that floor of red tiles, or brick highly varnished, the coolness of which, in the present hot weather, was highly grateful. I have designated this room as light and airy, and truly it was so, for it was illuminated by no less than six windows. Three of these in the front commanded a pleasant view over the well-wooded and beautifully-cultivated country beyond the great Brussels road, which ran beneath them--the fields more resembling extensive gardens than anything else. As this part of the house, projected beyond the _porte cochère_, a window in the side afforded a peep up the road, terminated by the town of Dendermonde, which hence appeared embosomed in trees. Two fine acacias in front of the gateway overshadowed this with their delicate pensile foliage, and screened it from the hot rays of the afternoon sun. The remaining two windows in the back looked into a delicious and carefully-kept garden, divided as usual by those verdant hornbeam walls into different departments. Such was my saloon. My bed-room, if so it may be called, was equally neat and simple in its equipment: a low bedstead without curtains, bedding of humble materials, but so clean that the most fastidious could have found no fault with it, a chair or two, and a small dressing-table in the single window, constituted its whole furniture. Having made arrangements for establishing our mess here, I set off to visit my people, who, as before mentioned, were scattered by threes and fours all over the commune amongst the farmers; and with these good and simple people I found them already quite at home. In most houses I found them seated at dinner with the family--at all they had been invited so to do; and everywhere the greatest good-humour and best possible understanding prevailed between the host and guests. When I asked, “Ist der meister content mit den Soldaten?”--gibberish coined for the occasion, as they understood no French, and I no Flemish--the answer was always a hearty “Yaw, mynheer--yaw! ist brav--ist goot”--at the same time goodnaturedly slapping one of them on the back, and leering archly round at the others. Boys, women, and children would all swarm round me, exclaiming “Goot, goot, goot!” Then, anticipating my wish to see the horses, one of them would invite me to the stables, which, though dark, were all warm and comfortable. Here I found our cattle stowed away, perhaps, amongst half-a-dozen of their elephants of horses, literally living in clover, for their racks and mangers were full of it (the finest I ever saw), and their stalls of clean straw up to their bellies. These good people seemed quite proud of having made the lucky brutes so comfortable. I found afterwards from our Juge de Paix that this bounty was in some measure repaid by the dung, which is here so valuable that the production of one horse in four-and-twenty hours is worth at least three or four pounds of hay, and perhaps four times the quantity of clover.

These farming establishments were very much alike, generally speaking; embosomed in orchards, which in their turn are surrounded by lofty elms. The dwelling-house is usually of brick, only one floor, a high roof, under which are the dormitories with garret-windows, sometimes two tiers of them. On the ground-floor the windows are large and open in the French style, outside shutters almost invariably _green_. Commonly there are only two rooms on this floor, one on each side of the passage, the door of which opens on the yards, as do the windows. One of these rooms is the kitchen, or ordinary residence of the family, the other is a _salle de cérémonie_. In the first is the usual display of brass pans, kettles, crockery, &c., which, with some common benches and a large table or two, constitute its furniture. As everywhere throughout this country, the most perfect cleanliness prevails, and the metallic lustre of the brass is brought out as much as scrubbing can effect. The _salle_ exhibits a collection of stiff old-fashioned chairs with rush bottoms and high upright carved backs, ponderous oaken tables, snow-white window-curtains, and a series of very common prints, in as common frames, suspended from the walls. These usually represent saints, &c. On the chimney-piece waxen or earthenware figures of animals, fruits, &c.; and frequently affixed to the wall over the centre one sees a kind of deep frame or box with glass front, in which, amongst cut paper, moss, or shell-work, is either a crucifix or a portrait of the Virgin and child. The barns, stables, cow-houses, and other out offices, form the other three sides of a square of which the front of the dwelling is the fourth. A rough pavement of about ten or twelve feet wide runs all round in front of the building; the remainder of the area is one vast dunghill, having a reservoir in the centre to receive its drainings, whilst it receives those of the cow-houses, stables, and dwelling by means of gutters constructed for the purpose. This precious fluid is the great dependence of the Flemish agriculturist, as the principal fertiliser of his fields. When the land is to be manured, it is carted out upon the grounds in a large tub (like a brewing-tub). A boy leads the cart very slowly all over the field, whilst a man, armed with a scoop, keeps scattering it in all directions. It must be confessed that the fields after this aspersion do not exhale the most savoury odours, but then nothing can exceed their fertility. The country about Dendermonde was, generally speaking, laid out in long narrow patches, separated from each other sometimes by a belt of turf, sometimes by a footpath, at others by ditches, along the edge of which might be a growth of alders, but no regular hedges anywhere. Towards the Dender, ditches of water were the common division, and these fields were fertilised by irrigation, not by the scoop, and a more beautiful verdure could not be seen, all being pastures; of the other fields or patches, each bore a different crop, some flax, some wheat, some _trèfle_ or clover, some buckwheat, some hops--the whole district having the appearance of one vast garden. The soil in general was a light rich mould, but degenerating into sand as it approached the Scheldt, on the north side of St Gille. The absence of hedges was fully compensated by the numerous copses that enriched the scenery in all directions, together with the rows of trees with which almost every road was bordered, so that, although a dead level, nothing could be more pleasing than the pictures it presented, except the tract towards the Scheldt, which was bleak enough.

My rounds finished, I returned to my billet, where I found our people all assembled, and we soon sat down to a most excellent dinner. The wine, which we had procured from the town, was thin, pale, almost white, but of a very piquant flavour, and over it we were enjoying ourselves, when a servant came in, and announced that M. le Juge, having that moment returned from the town, begged permission to pay his respects to M. le Commandant. Permission granted. Enter a little vulgar-looking man, about sixty years of age, whose coarse and by no means prepossessing physiognomy was not improved by the loss of an eye; nor was his person set off to the best advantage by his costume, consisting of a shabby blue frock, dark waistcoat sprigged over with golden flowers, and very long drab pantaloons, hanging about his legs in large folds, evidently unrestrained by any suspensatory process. His head was surmounted by a sort of forage-cap of dark-green velvet, with a band of silver lace, and a silver tassel falling over the crown. Doffing this, with a profusion of bows he casts his sharp single eye inquiringly round our party, exclaiming, “M. le Commandant?” I bow. “M. le Commandant, se trouve-t-il bien ici?” I assent, and express my gratitude to his better half for her attentions. “Da tout, M. le Commandant, da tout! Elle n’a rien fait que son devoir aupres de vous, M. le Commandant! Et de plus, je vous engagé de considerer la maison and les domestiques tous à votre service, M. le Commandant--tous, tous, tous!” (pronouncing strongly the final _s_ of the last word) “et si, par hazard, M. le Commandant aimerait la solitude, voilà la joli promenade là bas,” pointing to the garden. All this passed with us as mere words; but we had formed a wrong estimate of our Juge, who fulfilled to the utmost his professions, and turned out a very worthy fellow. Whilst this colloquy was in progress, our friend had established himself at the table with less ceremony than might have been expected from so complimentary a gentleman, and the bottle, circulating briskly, had the usual effect of loosening tongues and tightening friendship. M. le Juge begged to know where we had obtained our wine, which he did not approve of; it was not such as we ought to drink; begged permission to send for some of a very superior quality from his own cellar. The wine is brought accordingly, a bottle drawn by Monsieur himself with great solemnity and some grimace, relating at the same time its whole history. Clean glasses are called for, Monsieur fills a bumper, and after contemplating it for a moment against the light, hands it to me with a profound inclination. In colour it exactly resembles what is on the table. I taste it: there is not a shade of difference in the flavour. M. le Juge fills a glass for each of my companions, and hands it to them with the same ceremonious bow. It was easy to see that their opinions coincided with mine; but we did not wish to hurt the good man, and so we one and all smacked our lips, and pronounced it excellent. He immediately ordered a further supply, and insisted on our drinking nothing else. However, the bottles becoming mingled on the table, none of us could distinguish the difference, and our friend himself, I observed, filled his own glass indiscriminately from the one and the other. He meant to treat us, and took this way of accomplishing it, no doubt. We found him an intelligent, facetious companion, although, as we got farther into the night, he did get a little prosy with his anecdotes of the good people of Dendermonde. _En revanche_, he amused us much with a description of the process of enrolling the militia then going on; and droll pictures he drew of the peasantry who were brought to him for that purpose every day by the _gens-d’armés_. It would seem that these people were forced into the service sorely against their will, being much attached to Buonaparte, and quite averse to the new order of things. This seemed to be the general feeling amongst the bourgeois of Dendermonde, as far as we could learn; and it appeared very doubtful whether our worthy host himself, although a public functionary under the new Government, did not participate in this rage for Napoleon and Impérialisme. Be that, however, as it may, he was so well pleased with our society, that the first cocks crew ere he retired, his hiccoughing adieus and twinkling eye fully demonstrating that, for him at least, the wine was not quite such watery stuff as we had at first imagined. To us _port-drinkers_ it was innocuous. The next day we had leisure to look about us, and visit Dendermonde--a place, in my mind, inseparably connected with Corporal Trim and Uncle Toby; and no little amusement was it to my good Juge and his spouse when I related to them the story. They thought it all true for a time.

Whilst my comrades sought the town, I turned to the country, which for me has infinitely more charms. The steeple of a village church peering above the trees about a mile from us, on the Brussels road, attracted me in that direction. The opulent village of Lebbeke, embowered in orchards, appeared peculiarly animated as I approached it. White tents, horses at picket in long lines, groups of artillerymen, peasants and their waggons bringing loads of hay, intermingled amongst the apple-trees, enlivened the scene. Three batteries of 9-pounders were parked in the orchards, and their people partly billeted in the farms, partly encamped near their guns. It was a curious medley of peace and war. Here a large barn by the roadside, its doors thrown wide open, and peasants within busily occupied in threshing, spoke of the former; the guns and their accompaniments in the opposite orchard, of the latter--the horses, looking cool and comfortable under the shade of a fine row of elms, quietly eating their hay, or playfully biting each other. Gunners and drivers, half undressed, were lounging about the tents, or sitting on the wall by the roadside, contentedly smoking their pipes; others busy cleaning their appointments, or raking up the hay in front of the horses.

Large, substantial-looking farm-houses principally formed the village street, and by their comfortable appearance aroused the taste for rural life; but this would be overset by the sight of an officer, his coat unbuttoned, forage-cap on head, and cigar in mouth, lolling listlessly out of a casement, as if perfectly at home--a sight directly antagonistic to the tranquillity of rural retirement. The Flemish waggons, with their teams and drivers, bringing loads of hay, amused me much--long-bodied, and on low wheels, drawn by four, and sometimes five, immense animals, overloaded with fat. The waggoner, walking beside the fore-wheels, guides his team with some dexterity by means of long reins of cord running through holes in the haims. The horses are harnessed two and two, if the team be of four--otherwise two in the wheel and three leaders abreast, always separated from the wheelers by exceedingly long traces; the pole invariably used. The richer farmers, as with us, affect great show in their teams, the harness being gay with fringes and tassels of coloured worsted, and the haims are always particularly fine. These are of wood, flat, about four or five inches broad, the edges frequently studded with brass nails, the front decorated with painted flowers, and often with the Imperial eagle. The overgrown horses are pampered like pet lapdogs, and never required to do one quarter of the work they are capable of. They are noble brutes.

However rich the scenery of this country may be from its cultivation, still, in an Englishman’s eye, there is something wanting. Except on the pastures along the Dender, no cattle are ever seen animating the fields. The absence of hedges or other fences obliges the farmer to keep these shut up, except for a short period after the harvest, when they are turned out to pick up what they can along the borders and on the _trèf_ layers.

The quantity of manure accumulated by keeping them up is considerable, and no doubt enters into the farmer’s calculation. Sheep in small flocks (for I do not see that any large ones are kept) are taken out to pasture by a shepherd and two or three dogs--not at all resembling our sheep-dogs, except in sagacity, but small black curs with long tails. I have seen one of these shepherds dozing on a bank by the roadside, whilst his little flock, grazing in an adjoining slip of grass-land, was quite as efficiently watched as if the fellow had been wide awake. This slip was bounded on three sides by young wheat, and on each of the dividing borders was posted one of these curs. As the flock moved forward or backward so did the dogs; and whilst they fed, these intelligent animals kept incessantly running backwards and forwards on their post like sentinels, instantly darting at any sheep that attempted to break bounds, and driving it back into the grass-plot. The day was exceedingly warm, and their lolling tongues proclaimed that the little animals had no very light task of it, whatever their master’s might be.

The town of Dendermonde (of which I saw but little) is situated on the right bank of the Scheldt, at the point where the little river Dender flows into it, as the name imports--Dender mond or mund--_Dender mouth_. This river flows through it, and, being backed up by sluices, forms the basin I noticed on the day of our arrival. It is not large, and its population might be about 5000 or 6000--manufacturers of linens, fustians, &c. &c. The fortifications have nearly disappeared, the only remnant that I saw being something like a ravelin on the Alost side. It is, however, so surrounded by water, and the country is so flat, that an extensive inundation could soon be formed to supply their place if necessary. The general aspect of the town is mean and gloomy, but on the side next to St Gille were several good-looking houses, though all built of the same dark stone. We saw here more pretty women, however, than we had yet met with, always excepting in Zêle.